Boingy Boingy Dot Com

I wrote this story last year as an attempt to 1. write as an adolescent boy, a species that I am morbidly fascinated by, and 2. try to write 'funny.' Not sure if I succeeded really on either of those fronts, but I kind of like the story anyway.

She Made It All Up
by Summer Burton

One thing that never happened is that Amanda Lane never kissed me. She didn’t ask me to walk with her behind the oak tree next to the playscape; she didn’t look at me with her eyelids all low, which makes her face look weird but older; she didn’t reach up for my face and pretend to brush something out of my hair while leaning closer and closer to me so I could pretty much smell everything she ate for lunch and breakfast; and I definitely didn’t find myself pressing my mouth to hers and even opening it a little, enough that the very tip of her tongue was between my lips. That did not happen.

The reason that didn’t happen, and could never happen, and if in some bizarre alternate universe it did happen would be a big, big problem: Amanda is my best-friend-from-third-grade Thomas’ girl and they are going to get married. Or at least that’s what Thomas told me the day before Amanda did not kiss me. I told him that was a pretty pussy thing to say and that no one got married to their seventh grade girlfriends and that if they did get married she would probably divorce him and take all of his money, but Thomas shook his head and said it was love. At which point I did not feel even the slightest bit sick or jealous or weird, in fact I felt so normal that I called him a chick and hit him on his shoulder.

Amanda looks a little bit like Natalie Portman from the Star Wars movies. Mostly in two ways: one is that she is really skinny but she doesn’t look all bony like Theresa Williams or models, and the other is that she has this smile that’s really hard to look at. It’s hard to look at her smile (Natalie Portman’s or Amanda’s) because it seems like she knows something that you don’t, and also like she knows that you don’t know it, and also that she thinks that’s kind of funny and sad and sweet all at the same time. It’s terrible.

Amanda lives on my block and her parents have more money than mine which I know is true because Amanda has a new bike, not a used one from Goodwill, and because one time she told me that they have a maid. I looked for the maid at their house every time I passed by but then later she told me that she only comes once every two weeks, so they aren’t that rich.

Thomas lives further away but he has a new bike too and sometimes he rides it to my house and then we go to Amanda’s house and make fun of her together. Thomas says that it makes her like him more. I guess he’s right because, after a while, they usually tell me to go home so they can make out. I have never made out with someone at my house or at their house, and I guess sometimes I kind of wonder what that’s like but I never stop at Amanda’s window and glance in on my way across her yard. If I did it would just be to take notes for my future make out sessions with girlfriends who will have smiles that don’t make me feel stupid. But I don’t.

I did make out with Theresa Williams two months ago in the back yard of a party at Terrence Rhodes’ house. She was wearing a sweatshirt so she looked less bony than usual and besides I just needed the practice. Afterwards she said that we were going out and I told her that she was a bad kisser, which was only half the truth and the other half is something that I can’t talk about, but I swear it doesn’t have anything to do with Amanda.

Amanda and Thomas have been together for five months, which is longer than anyone else in our grade has ever gone out with anyone, so it seems like it’s pretty serious. So, if there was some weirdo universe where Amanda kissed me behind that tree, and where my entire chest and stomach felt like they were filled with tiny ticklish pieces of fur or confetti or something, I’d be pretty confused right now. Luckily, that didn’t happen and I feel completely normal and nothing on my insides feels like it’s been rearranged at all.

One time Thomas asked me who I thought the prettiest girl in our grade was and I asked him if he wanted the truth. This is because I can not lie to my best friend, but I know that sometimes people would prefer that you lie and I guess if he ever asked me not to tell him something for his own good I could lie then. But he said he wanted the truth and so I told him Amanda. I thought he might hit me but he just said “I know, man. She’s so fucking hot.” Thomas doesn’t say “fucking” very often so I knew he was trying to make sure that I was paying attention to what he was saying. He put his hand on my back. “I’m glad you support me, man.” I wasn’t sure what that meant but I guess he was saying that me saying Amanda was hot meant that I was happy for him that she was his girl. I guess that should be true.

My mom doesn’t seem to like Amanda’s family very much and every time she runs into Amanda’s mom she ends up in our kitchen telling my dad how “waspy” the Lanes are. I guess I know what she means. Amanda’s mom is just like a taller version of Amanda with her skin pulled a little bit tighter, and I guess they both seem like they might be hiding some kind of poison stinger behind their backs. The smile that’s hard to look at might just be a trick to get you stung, you know?

It’s good that Amanda did not kiss me behind that tree and that I didn’t feel her boobs pressed against my t-shirt and that she didn’t tell me afterwards she wanted to break up with Thomas to go out with me because I was a nicer kisser, because if she did than I would probably have run home and put my entire head under the kitchen sink to calm down before Thomas came over and then when he did I would have been really freaked out and he would keep asking me what was wrong and I would keep saying ‘nothing’ even though that wouldn’t be true and then I would have a feeling in my stomach even worse than the one I would have had when Amanda’s mouth was so soft, a feeling that I was keeping something from my best-friend-since-third-grade and then Thomas might have suggested that we go over to Amanda’s and I might have flinched or made some kind of weird face and he might have said “what, man?” and I might have shrugged and, not knowing what to say, I might have said that I thought she was kind of a bitch for not letting him feel up her shirt yet after a whole five months and Thomas might have looked really thoughtful and then said “you’re right man” and then later, after his mom agreed to let him spend the night since it was a Friday, he might suggest that we play some kind of joke on Amanda and we might have grabbed all of the toilet paper in my bathroom and snuck out and thrown it all up in her trees and then the next day Amanda’s mom might come over and ask my mom about it and I might start crying and Thomas might call me a pussy and get on his bike and go home and then Amanda’s mom might tell her that we had done it and Amanda might not speak to me or Thomas for a whole week at school, she might just smile her terrible way and make us both feel small, so small. And Thomas might forgive me for letting on that we had rolled the house, but I might never forget that I hadn’t told him about what really happened with Amanda and then one day, two months later, when I had a new girlfriend – Stacy Park, who is almost as pretty as Amanda and has much bigger boobs – Amanda might smile her terrible smile at us in class and then pass Thomas a note that he will read and then crumple up into a ball and then he might stare at his desk for awhile before staring at me for awhile and we will all know everything, and then Thomas might hit me in the face and Stacy might break up with me after Amanda tells her the whole story too, and then I might be alone almost all the time and then one day I would ride my bike past Amanda’s house and see Thomas’ bike locked to the tree and I would not, I would never, lower my head and look into their window and see his hands underneath her sweater, see them holding each other and see Amanda smile some different smile, one that I’d never seen before, a smile that would make me look away and make my feet feel heavy with everything inside of me dropped right into them.

So, it’s good that Amanda didn’t kiss me, even if it might have all felt worth it anyway.

Labels: mywriting

See original posts here and here. This is still but a small chunk of the full text... These little ideas and affirmations are written as Me talking to Myself, so please don't read condescension or ego into them. They are things that I am working on, not things that I'm actually telling anyone else they Should do. If you're inspired, I hope it's to come up with your own manifesto, not listen to little me. Heart.

..

Be healthy and reasonable. I am a firm believer in ‘overdoing it’ – occasionally. So called benders, all nighters, and codependent relationships have comprised a good chunk of my favorite memories and best times. However, don’t underestimate the less exciting joys in life – days where you feel clear-headed, well-rested, and you can breathe deeply. Running without having to catch your breath is one of the best things in the word. The occasional spell of living balls-to-the-wall is taking advantage of life; taking your body for granted is wasting it. Being tired, hungover, regretful, and aching is not carpe diem. Morning can be just as special as nights. Not drinking can be just as fun as drinking. Things that can be a lot more fun than parties include swimming, sleeping outside, and spending a day laying under the sun.

& drink water, as much as you can. It will make you feel better than coffee in the morning, it will keep your insides happy, and it will occasionally, like magic, remind you of how just special and lucky you are to be alive on this planet.

-

Share beauty. Be like the grandmothers who send newspaper clippings about movies to their film student grandkids. Keep your home stocked with blank CDs and postage stamps. When you hear a song that reminds you of someone, play it for them. When you read a poem that rearranges your insides, mail it to all of your friends who’ve moved away. If a stranger sees you drawing a picture and compliments it, give it to them. Don’t let ambitious ideas about delivery keep you from passing on small joys. Tell jokes that made you laugh. Lend out movies that make you feel high. Bake cookies. Give away stuff you don’t use that someone else can. It’s the best rule from kindergarden: share. It makes everything more fun.

-

An informal study shows that these are the things that people talk about at parties and bars: TV shows (either synopsizing ‘good shows’ that are out now, or for the more elite, reminiscing about shows we all watched as children), romantic relationships – usually other people’s and usually in a fairly shallow way, music – usually other people’s and usually in a fairly shallow way (‘I know this band and you do too’ as opposed to how songs or sounds make us feel), work – almost always negative, and how drunk/fucked-up/tired/wired they are. My suggestion is that you force yourself, as much as you possibly can, to talk about something else. Talk about your favorite birds, talk about interesting places you’ve seen and what made them different from here, talk about the worst haircut you’ve ever had, talk about death, talk about coffee, talk about sex, make original jokes (quoting ‘The Big Lebowski’ is almost never funny anymore, I’m sorry to say), or even try something other than talking: drawing, dancing, or playing a game. Obviously the topics mentioned come up so often for a reason – they’re easy things to discuss in a diverse range of (white alternative twenty something) people… but I’m starting to get déjà vu. All the time.

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Never be depressed at a wedding. Allow yourself to be happy for others instead of feeling sorry for yourself. Don’t compare your life to your friend’s lives. Not only will it almost inevitably lead to self-deprecation, it’s also unfair to your friends. Happiness can come from lots of places, and if you only allow it to occur when something ‘good’ happens to you, you’re being a selfish jerk. Additionally, you have no idea what other people’s life and situations really are in any kind of detail. Comparisons often = be careful what you wish for. That skinny girl with big boobs on the arm of the boy you think is neat? She probably envies your confidence and creativity. Maybe she’s jealous of your easy, fun relationship with her dude. Maybe she thinks that your haircut is a lot cooler than hers. Point is that both of you would be a lot happier, and maybe even become friends, if you weren’t thinking about yourselves in relation to someone else.

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Don’t rely on the internet (read: face/space) to get to know people. This often leads to making the High Fidelity mistake and assuming that what people like is more important than what they’re like. Sure, it’s fun to notice that a boy you like shares the same taste in movies as you, but in reality it’s next to meaningless. Everyone hears, reads, sees, and likes things differently and for different reasons – and those reasons, which are impossible to summarize on a website, are what make people unique and amazing. There are thousands if not millions of people in the world who have the exact same favorite book as you. What makes you interesting is the why. It’s much more signifying to play a song for someone and see if they care to pay attention and if they have anything interesting to say about it than it is to simply note that they like the ‘right’ songs. It’s also fun to learn new things about people as you spend time with their actual faces. It’s a lot less fun to already know everything they might be excited to tell you about. Lastly, and I say this as a very enthusiastic and overt lover of lists and surveys: keep in mind that people are infinitely more complicated than any set of questions and answers. Studying someone’s myspace profile obsessively not only takes a lot of the fun surprises out of getting to know them, it can also lead to an unfortunate faux-familiarity that can lead you to be disappointed by what should be their actually much more exciting authentic self.

Labels: manifesto, mywriting

Beholder:

When I asked David what he saw in me, it wasn’t related to the blindness. I didn’t mean for it to be. I was just fishing for something endearing to hold on to the nights he chose to spend at his apartment, or the weekends he went out of town. Something like “You are a magical girl, Shelly. Your laugh makes my stomach warm,” or “You’re the smartest person I’ve ever met and you challenge me in a way that forces me to be a better person,” or “you’re really good with your mouth, it feels like the real thing, it really does.”

But he blinked his white pupils at me when I said it and I immediately clapped my hand over my mouth, not that he could see that. He looked at me, though. He did. It took me awhile to get used to how a blind person can look at you, but trust me – they can. He senses where I am. He never opens his eyes as widely as a normal – I mean, not-blind – person would, but he looks right at me, he does.

He spoke before I could apologize for my wording. “I see in you a fog. I see in you a picture I saw before, of a girl in a book with yellow braids because you told me your hair was long and golden.” At this point I felt a little guilty thinking of my matte, hay-colored curls. It’s easy to exaggerate when a cute blind boy asks you to describe yourself. “I see you surrounded by light but you yourself are always in shadow. I see the outline of you shine so bright that I close my eyes, again, and they never stop closing.”

At this point I really wanted to cut him off because it was starting to feel like a little much and I worried about what he would say next.

“I see you as soft. I see your smell… you smell like cat litter but also like honey and melons, so I see a kitten full of fruit. I see your voice as a kitten too. I see you all the time, whether you’re here or not, because nothing I see ever changes but you are standing behind my eyes, in my head, smiling at me and not-shining all the time. What I see in you, when I look at you – or whatever you want to call it – is a shape that softens every sharp thing.”

And then he asked me what I saw in him and I said, trying to hide the tears in my voice, “I like the way you speak and I like the space between your nose and your mouth and I like your mother,” and by that point I guess it was pretty obvious that I was crying and David had his arms around me. I know he thought I was crying with joy because he had said such nice things to me after I’d said something insensitive, but really I was crying because he had reminded me, once again, as he would every day we were together, that he would never simply say that I was “beautiful.”

Labels: love, mywriting

I'll be deleting these posts in a couple weeks but I'll let you know where to read the entire manifesto if you are interested. Thanks for saying nice things. I'm just trying to be a better person, and I think that writing all of this down is helping:


Don’t let other people’s perception of who you are imprison you. Change! Change! Change! And when you do, and you will, be self-satisfied with your progression. Don’t have expectations about your friends or acquaintances catching on immediately. It takes awhile for people to notice that someone isn’t who they used to be. But if you allow yourself to do just that, the applause will come in time. Be whoever you are right now and forget about who you were. Please don’t be afraid that people don’t want you to be different. There will always be people who long for the past, but by setting an example of flexibility and adaptability, you are capable of inspiring them to follow your lead. Evolution informs every second of our lives. Embrace it. Change! Change! Change!

Read. All the time. Nothing will aid your evolution more.

Write things down. Write love letters, great emails, stories, poems, songs, articles, novels. Writing serves at least three purposes (probably more like 300):
a. it clarifies your brain,
b. it helps you remember things you would otherwise forget,
c. it aids understanding between people.
I think the last purpose is especially important, which is why I suggest that you share at least some of your writing. That understanding that someone can glean from what you write -- remember, honestly! -- will often allow them to relate to you better than you could have imagined and experience the glorious truth that we’re all a lot more alike than we are different. I don’t believe that writing is an occupation for a gifted or special set of people. Writing is essential to a full existence, like music and kissing.

Labels: mywriting

This is the very beginning of something that's going to be pretty epic when I'm done.

--

A GIRL'S MANIFESTO : March 20 2008 : Part One

Be candid. Honesty is more attractive than any attempt to be attractive. Tell people what you like about them. Tell people when they hurt your feelings. Tell people you want to kiss their face, or that you love them, or that they make you feel like a crazy person. Speak directly and simply. Argue when it matters. Don't try to be or play it cool. Start by telling everyone about your manifesto and don't bother with a long disclaimer. Your honesty will inspire others to do the same and put everyone's intentions and feelings on the table, all the time. Ask for what you want instead of taking what you get. The answer might be 'yes,' and if it isn't you're better off knowing now. Get used to talking without trying to make people laugh. Don't leave anything out with the people that matter and don't bother with people who don't. Establish honesty as a given when you make new friends. Admit your mistakes and request that others apologize for theirs. Don't confuse honesty with being self-effacing or embarrassing yourself -- honesty includes all of the good things as well as the bad ones. Maintain dignity! Don't confuse gossip with honesty, either. Telling your own secrets is okay; telling other people's isn't. Honesty isn't negativity, cruelty, or narcissism. Listening can be just as honest as talking. Don't confuse simple, reasonable honesty with radical silliness. There is no reason to try to articulate blurry feelings or over-explain every detail The point is to be honest instead of internalizing, not to try to extract juicy confessionals out of everyday life. And remember: saying something out loud can sometimes make it true, rather than the other way around. Proceed cautiously, but let. it. out.

Say yes. Your intuition is excellent. If something is available, safe, and appealing... do it! Dessert, Cranium with strangers, dinner with a coworker you've never seen outside of the workplace but love talking to, a show or a movie by yourself, the poetry game: YES. Life is too short to wonder what you might have missed.

On the flip side, say no sometimes. To things you don't really want to do. Don't obsess about missing out if a night at home seems more appealing than a party or the bar. Missing out could just as easily be feeling miserable or tired 'out' when you could have been reading and listening to songs with your cat.

Make things: music, food, stuffed animals, mixtapes, paintings, clothes, comics, robots, zines, manifestos, websites, movies, toys, sculptures, cupcakes, love, and tools. Don't do it because you think you should or to make money, do it because it will make you really, really, really happy. Everytime you see, use, give away, hear, eat, smell, sell, touch, or just think of smething you have made with your own hands, head, or heart, you will love yourself. Infinitely.

Don't drink cokes, smoke cigarettes, or eat food from convenience stores. But if you do those things, don't hate yourself for it. There are worse things you could do to yourself -- like not sleeping, not reading, or not demanding that people treat you with respect.

Encourage your friends to realize their potential and value themselves as much as you value them. Push them. Don't be afraid to tell them what you believe them to be capable of -- whether it's writing the great American novel, being a great mom, dumping the asshole, or ending a war. Applaud grandiosity. There's a reason you chose them. They're good for more than just drinking buddies. Help them and use them to help yourself. Rely on each other and do great things. Create a community. Never ever roll your eyes at someone you love.

Don't be afraid to be cheesy. The best things in life are easily ridiculed -- like this.

--

Much more to come, in a different format, at which time this post will most likely be deleted. For now, keep that shit in mind, yo.

Labels: mywriting

Experimenting with flash fiction...

I decided to shut-up. Every morning I pressed glue to my mouth, made the lipstick face and held it there for forty seconds. Every morning. At my job I wore my headphones and sent emails instead of calling. My boss thought I was working harder and he gave me a raise. I nodded at him, my mouth frozen.

I forgot why I’d done it, it seemed like such a great idea anyway. After awhile people stopped trying to talk to me, they got so used to me having nothing to say. My parents called and I sent them letters in response; my mom called it charming.

Then one day I saw you on the street and I felt it again. I ripped open my mouth and my lips bled. I touched your shoulders and said “I love you” close to your ear. Your shirt was marked with my blood. You just looked away.

Labels: love, mywriting

because i know you're all so interested. this really is short, in comparison to the whole goddamn thing:

Will Sheff, Zach Thomas, and Seth Warren met in high school in New Hampshire, and together picked up instruments and barely avoided being expelled. They parted ways for college. Will’s college experience was a nightmare, but as he phrases it on the Okkervil River website “Each of my nervous breakdowns fell away when I made the most important decision of my life: to be a total failure.” Seth and Will moved to Austin, where Zach Thomas was already living, and in 1998, Okkervil River was born.

1998 was the year I turned 16. My musical life was populated by shitty bands I’d heard on top-40 radio and the saving grace of my parents and their excellent taste in folky songwriters. Thanks mostly to my mom, my favorite album was Blue by Joni Mitchell. I had it recorded on a tape and when I walked and bussed around Austin I’d listen to it on repeat, only occasionally switching it out for a tape of Bob Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks, or my brother’s copy of Nirvana’s Nevermind.

A couple years after moving to Austin and forming the band, Will Sheff scored a writing gig for the music/file-sharing website Audiogalaxy.com. I read Will’s reviews enthusiastically before I had ever heard of Okkervil River. During this time, Will penned an article for the site’s “Rewind” feature on favorite albums from the past, and wrote about Blue.

“During subsequent listens to Blue, I became amazed at the subtlety of Mitchell's language - the elegant forms of her lines, her skill with metaphor, her alternation of clever internal rhymes with blunt, plain asides - as well as the small ways she'd worked to feminize her narratives. I'd always thought critics who talked about "feminine vs. masculine" styles of engaging an audience were being essentialist and vaguely insulting until I heard Mitchell, perhaps the songwriter most successful at imprinting a mysterious femininity to her songs which is hard to trace but which makes them feel as much the work of a woman as [Leonard] Cohen's feel like the work of a man.” –Will Robinson Sheff

Reading these thoughts on Blue solidifies my understanding of why it’s been such an important album to me for the last ten years, while my other musical tastes and favorites have swirled and evolved and shifted dramatically around it. I have always devoured words -- books and songs and conversation – but as I reached adolescence it became difficult to find a perspective that I could actually relate to as a woman without delving into the boring world of romance novels, ultra-saccharine female singer-songwriters, and girls who wanted to talk exclusively about boys and shoes. I rebelled against feminine culture by hanging on my nerdy male friends, playing role playing games and reading comic books. Joni Mitchell was one of the only things in my life that kept me from feeling completely divorced from my biological makeup. Joni is unabashedly feminine, in love with perfume and clean sheets, but she was also unabashedly human and very much alive. She sang about dancing and kissing statues and being helplessly drunk on love, and it seemed to me that she lived a life that I wanted to live. Someday.

Okkervil River recorded and self-released a seven song album called Stars Too Small To Use in 1999. It took three years for their next effort and their first real full-length, Don’t Fall In Love With Everyone You See to be released. It was the first time I would hear them, specifically the first song on the album, “Red.”

I immediately felt moved by the song to a spectacular degree. My friend Brian almost immediately decided that it was his favorite song of all time, out placing “Car” by Built To Spill. Brian and I listened to “Red” together a lot, speculating on what made it so special. We both felt that Will Sheff had created (or remembered, we weren’t sure) a perfect character and story. It still sounds perfect to me. The drums are steady and quiet, the organ alone could make me cry, and Will’s perspective on the mother-daughter relationship is almost unbelievably empathic.

Red is my favorite color, red like your mother’s eyes after awhile of crying about how you don’t love her. She says “I know I don’t deserve supervised sight of her, but each day becomes a blur without my daughter.”

Looking back, I think that what I heard in Okkervil River was similar to what I’d always heard in Joni Mitchell. I’m not saying that I can relate to Will Sheff’s songs as a woman, although that may be more true than he would care to hear about. What Will does is imagine a world as dark as the one that’s around me, but he shines a light on things that would otherwise be in shadow.

What the song “Red” says, in it’s own small and very specific way -- the thing that Brian and I heard and immediately took to heart -- is you are not alone. I am not alone. We are not alone. The infinite chasm between you and everyone else on the planet is smaller than you think. I understand you, and you understand me.

Labels: mywriting

It's been a long time since my terrible Slam days.

Shot In The Dark
Summer Burton

I am fighting unrealness.
It is a desperate and violent battle,
this fight for solidity.
The glow of computer screens and the
tender martyrdom of unrequited love
punches my gut and pierces my chest.
But I will not give up on actual touch, actual taste.

I was thinking about placing a classified ad.

SWF seeks something that will make her hands hurt,
but not her heart.

I have been having dreams about guns,
or maybe about not-guns. Dreams about
not knowing how to hold a gun,
or release the safety. Or shoot. Or breathe.
Dreams where I don’t know how to be not-safe.
Dreams in which the simple metal burns my hand
and I drop the thing immediately. Also, horses.

I know am going to win the fight.

SWF seeks someone who will show her how to shoot,
or give her something else to dream about. Either way.

I have been drinking more whiskey,
It was a conscious choice.
Doesn’t whiskey seem more real than other things?
Like water, wine, or milk? Milk is the most unreal of all;
suckling past infancy on another animal.
When did that ever make sense to anyone?
Where was I when this decision was made?

I am becoming more real every day, see?

SWF seeks ten-thousand weapons and an equal amount
anesthetic. SWF seeks a solution. SWF seeks.

Labels: mywriting, poetry

I went camping with a bunch of friends this weekend and, dorks that we are, we spent hours playing the 'poetry game'. Each player gets a page to start a poem and then passes it to the person next to them. As the poems get passed around, each player folds over the lines above the one they just wrote so you only get to see the line right before yours. Then when the papers are full, you read aloud. It was pretty much the funniest, most inspiring, bizarre, wonderful time ever. Although a lot of the poems were super ridiculous and silly, we impressed ourselves by collectively writing some genuinely beautiful stuff. Here are a few extra-solid examples of what we did. Keep in mind, these were written by eight people who had been drinking since 10:30 am.

Writing by Summer, Laurie, Kelly, Patrick, Gabriella, Bryan, Thomas, and Mandy, otherwise known as 'River Krause' :

-

She was under the music’s spell
She closed her eyes and dropped her guard
dropped her shirt and shoes.
Before she fell to the floor in a crumpled mess they all laughed and pointed.
She meant to fall down.
Scraped knees are dirty dignified badges.
Distinguished bruises, I cruise my memory for thoughts of you, morning pancake days.
Coffee, smokes. Pictures of you – every day.
A fresh start
But how many “fresh starts” do we each get?
Zero. Nothing is really new, is it?
But what did you really want to know?
I could tell you everything in five minutes but the truth would lose it’s luster.

-

Even when we yelled,
It tasted like a whisper
And then I heard silence coming back in from the cold wind.
And it was fascinating to hear silence.
The echo of empty it embraced
Like a rock tossed in a well.
Dark, cold, alone.
In a dungeon of doubt.
Handing on the cliff of a memory
holding on because letting go would mean something ended. You hate endings.
There’s a possibility that this won’t stop being painful, but what the hell.
It’s not always healthy to feel good.
Sometimes, it is necessary to die.
To be re-born…

-

Her eyes were tired.
Dark circles made her seem older, more experienced, sexy.
She was tired. Possibly.
Possibly because she was on some awesome drugs.
Or just seeing clearly for the last time.
The last time she opened her eyes, it hurt.
And she wished she were blind.
So she wouldn't see his...
It's not scary, not scary, not scary.
It's cinematic.
And profoundly monochromatic.
Meditated upon like Rothko.

-

Otis had it rough
and tumble
down down down until there was only me.
Well me, and that guy, and this girl make three.
Changing who I thought I could be.
You know, something kind of new. Maybe pink.
Maybe blue. For boys and sky -- two things I hate most of all.
"I'll break myself of it once and for all."
He said for the fourth time.
She watched the progress of her cigarette,
to be interpreted as the shortening of her patience.
He left without words, he wanted to hit her.
He ran to his car and punched the window.
Fuck!
You!

-

Hills ran for miles through the window of the train
the rain raced rivers on her cheeks,
cutting through the beauty shell.
I wash my face and stare at the mirror.
And hope they have forgotten my bad-luck incidents with their ancestors.
The ancient dead have no reason to forgive our bullshit.
But it doesn't matter, we leave them flowers.
Posies for rememberance, it feels like it's been hours.
Hours, or days -- it's easy to lose track.
Lose time, lost mind. Missing hours spent with an ex-boyfriend,
taking Zanax and talking on the phone.
Was that my phone going off? Hold on.
As per usual,
everything is always the same.

-

This is a great first line
It came from the record player, scratchy and proud
like a goddamn lullaby in the middle of the day
sung with conviction -- enough to believe.
They had stars like firecrackers in their eyes and then they stopped.
She reached out her hand like a ghost
and stuck it right through him.
"Oh," he said, "that feels nice."
But really, it felt awful.
...like a thousand tiny submarines of grief.
like a bathtub full of blood or money -- what's the difference?
Different strokes, different folks.
"That's the way," people say, "the game is played."
Cheaters win, and love becomes suspect.
Sluts win! Sluts win! Sluts win!
But we let them.

Labels: funny, lovedones, mywriting, poetry

Yes y'all.

This part is a short story that one of the character's writes and submits to her college's literary journal, inspired by some recent events in another's character's love life:

--

Ballad of the Bird Girl
By Najla Aziz

Miranda was twelve when the feathers started growing. At first, the downy grey that started to cover her lower belly seemed like just another mysterious product of adolescence. She wore high-waisted skirts and dresses and hoped they would go away. Eventually, one night she snook into her family’s kitchen, fill a plastic cup with ice, and took it back to her room. She filled a blue towel with as many pieces of ice as she could wrap up and applied the makeshift cold pack to her stomach until the skin around the feathers was pink and numb. Then she grabbed a hold of one of the feathers and began plucking.
Miranda kept all of her discarded feathers in a tin on the windowsill above her bed, until it was full and she started keeping them in plastic bags, tied at the top and stored on the top shelf of her closet. She imagined that eventually she would have enough to start sewing pillows or downy blankets.
When she entered high school and made friends with some of the girls in her classes, she joined into conversations about the awkwardness and hilarity of first periods and stretch marks. One day, she asked, “what about feathers?” The other girls stared at her, and then dissolved in laughter. “Miranda is so funny! Miranda is so RANDOM! I love you Miranda!”
It wasn’t until Miranda was all grown up and out of school that she found the courage brought up the feathers to anyone again, this time a boy she had been kissing for a few weeks. When she told him, he laughed, but this time she remained firm. “No, seriously. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
She found the tin, and the bags full of feathers, now filling two large plastic tubs in the corner of her apartment.
“Look.”
The boy looked at her incredulously, and started asking her how many birds she had to kill for this sick prank. When she began crying, he left her apartment, sure that she was certifiably insane.
Miranda felt desperately lonely when she considered the option of keeping the feathers a secret forever. She had resented them, sure, but they seemed like an essential part of her being, and she knew that if she ever loved anyone she wouldn’t feel truly loved in return until she convinced him the feathers were real.
So, the bird girl decided to let herself be, and she stopped pulling her feathers. They grew in more quickly than she imagined they would, and they began sprouting in other places too – her shoulder blades, between her legs, on the tops of her feet. She kept to her apartment – it was too hot to cover her body thoroughly enough to hide the feathers and she didn’t want any questions from strangers at the store.
One day, the bird girl heard music playing outside her home. She pulled on an oversized sweater and opened her door. Outside, she found a group of musicians. Mesmerized, she sat cross-legged in front of them and listened. In the middle of the group, a boy sang songs that Miranda felt were being shot straight into her heart. When they finished playing, she began clapping and was soon joined by all of the other strangers who had joined her, sitting on the grass and admiring the musicians. She suddenly felt sad, realizing that the songs weren’t for her at all, and she started to go back inside when she felt a hand on her back. No one had touched her for months, and she was immediately paranoid that the hand would feel her feathers through the fabric of her sweater and recoil. It stayed, and she turned around to face her singer.
The singer and Miranda soon began spending time together. Mostly, she would invite him up to her apartment, where they would drink wine and he would play songs for her. He’d written hundreds of songs, but staring at Miranda made him feel that he needed to write a hundred more, just for her.
He wanted desperately to touch her, kiss her, lift her heavy clothes off of her head and start to map every inch of her body. But every time he moved towards her, she moved away, blushing and laughing.
One night, a thunderstorm broke holes in the sky and the singer and the bird girl were stranded at her apartment. As the hours ticked by and the rain never ceased, she sat nervously on the corner of her bed, drunk on most of a bottle of wine. The singer sat next to her and took her hand.
“I want to stay with you.”
The bird girl sighed and told him she had something to explain. She squeezed his hand, kissed his cheek, and invited him to lift off her sweatshirt.
The singer felt strange – such a forward invitation was not the way he had imagined this moment would happen, but he was desperate to see more of her, and he reached towards her, pulling the shirt off of her head and kissing her, hard on the mouth, before looking down.
By now, Miranda the bird girl was mostly covered in feathers – grey and white down sprinkled over her stomach, yellow and brown streaking her shoulders and her upper back. Around her chest, neck, and lower back, there was skin, but it was thin and pink, not quite human. He gasped, and Miranda sighed, feeling the sting of saltwater behind her eyes.
“What are you?” he asked quietly, not moving away.
“I don’t know,” Miranda responded, reaching for her shirt, ready for the singer to stand at any moment.
“Stop,” and he reached over her, staying her hand.
The singer kissed the bird girl’s chest and he could feel her heart beating twice as fast as his own. “I think you’re magic,” he spoke quietly, and laid her down on her bed, stroking the feathers on her stomach, aching to explore every part of the beautiful creature he felt lucky to see.
Secretly, the singer wondered if he had made her up, if she had materialized from one of his strange dreams. But when he made love to her, losing himself in the endless softness, when he slept beside her and woke up next to her the next day, a few stray feathers floating up from the bed like down escaping from a pillow, he knew she was, somehow, as real as anything else.
They had real problems, too. The bird girl was sensitive and often scared, she would repeatedly ask him when he was going to leave her, whether he wanted her to take care of “her problem,” whether he thought this “normal girl” or another was prettier than her. It took him months to convince her to leave the house with him, and when she finally did, she always bundled up in jackets and scarves and long pants, wanting to assure that her secret would remain her’s and the singer’s alone.
The singer’s friends and band mates didn’t understand what he saw in the bird girl, thought that she seemed childish and empty. He tried to explain what it was like between them when they were alone, sometimes even felt tempted to shout that she was a magical creature that was created just for him, delivered to him, for him to take care of and keep safe.
And this, in the end, was the biggest problem between the singer and the bird girl. He thought of her as his own, and for the most part didn’t consider that his own actions would ever affect their relationship. Although he did think that her feathers were beautiful, he also took comfort in knowing that she thought of herself as strange, unlovable, an oddity. The knowledge of her neuroses kept him secure, knowing that he was the only one who could ever really understand her.
After years of sleeping next to one another; after one particularly rough night where Miranda, inspired by whiskey, decided to try to fly off of her third floor balcony and fell hard on the porch below; after the singer tended to her wounds and kissed every feather; after she made a pillow of the down that she had collected in her teenage years and embroidered it with a bird perched on top of a music note; after all of this, Miranda started to gain an extraordinary amount of confidence in herself. She knew she had the singer to thank, but his possessiveness started to feel like a cage. She began to venture outside without him, often, making new friends and coming home late. Usually, especially after she drank, she would end calling him after the bars closed, begging him to come over and sleep next to her. He always agreed.
Eventually the bird girl started wearing fewer clothes when she went out, and inevitably, her new friends noticed something peeking out from under a tank top one night. She was drunk, and she just shrugged as one of her friends pulled down the top, peeking down at Miranda’s shoulders full of long, dappled feathers.
When the bird girl told the singer that a few of her friends had discovered her secret, he was horrified. He felt ready to comfort her, to reassure her that she wasn’t a freak. When she told him that they had loved it, found it extraordinary, even taken pictures, he was even more upset. He didn’t know how to explain to the bird girl how it made him feel that she had let someone else in on her secret. The singer waited for her to fall asleep before he began to cry.
It was soon after her friends discovered the feathers that Miranda met a boy who looked familiar. He reminded her of the birds she watched from her window – flighty, nervous, and beautiful. Miranda fought hard against the urge to ask him to see her again, but when she ran into him a few weeks later, the fated feeling of it all was too much. They made plans for the very next day, when she knew the singer would be busy.
The next day, when the bird girl kissed the bird boy, she didn’t think of the singer, or of her strange affliction, or of her friends, or of flying. She thought just of him -- the feeling of his mouth pressed to hers and the back of his front teeth on the tip of her tongue. She imagined the past life she was sure they had lived together, as sparrows or owls or seagulls dipping into the ocean. Her heart pressed against her skin and felt as if it was going to fall right out of her chest.
When they finally stopped kissing and stared at each other, the boy looked startled. He told her that he wasn’t sure how he felt or what he wanted from her. She rushed to explain, in a river of sentences that ran together, what he made her feel and what she was. When she tried to lift up her shirt to show him her feathers, he immediately flinched and looked away, asking her to keep her clothes on. The bird girl blushed, recalled her first kiss and the shame of the years that followed. Her heart slowed and receded. And when the bird girl began to cry, the boy stood up and walked away. He assumed that she was thinking of the singer, assuaged with guilt.
That night, Miranda did think of the singer. She lay in her bed, staring at all of the tokens and pieces of him that were scattered around her apartment. She realized that the reason she had pursued the bird boy had very little to do with past lives or destiny. It was just that her entire soul felt wrapped up in the love that she had, and she had wanted to feel what it would be like to unwrap it and get a good look at herself. Then she contemplated her life without him, and immediately felt panicked and afraid. She didn’t want to be alone, she told herself. She could work out her identity with him at her side. She would ask him to forgive her
When the bird girl told the singer what had happened, he wanted to understand. He tried to hold her when she began crying, but his hands wouldn’t move from their stilled position at his side. He tried to tell her that it was okay but when he opened his mouth he yelled terrible things.
The singer told Miranda that her heart was as hollow as a bird’s bones. He told her that she couldn’t possibly be real, because no real girl would be so cruel. He told her she was a child caught up in a fantasy she could never have, that believing that some boy was anything like her was a ridiculous and pathetic dream she had to avoid the truth, which was that she was too afraid of real life to hold on to the only person who could ever love her or even look at her without shuddering. He told her that the only reason her so-called friends hung around her was because she was an oddity, an animal.
The singer watched Miranda’s face crumble, and her limbs grow weak and shaky. He watched her start to grab at her feathers and let them fall to her sides. He watched her cry. He watched her as she ripped out huge chunks of grey and brown and yellow from her back and her stomach and between her legs, leaving her skin swollen and bare.
The singer could never forgive himself for the things he had said, but he also couldn’t forgive the Miranda for not loving him enough. When she finally stopped tearing herself apart and started breathing evenly, he left the room where he had first touched her and tried hard not to look back.
The bird girl stood, surrounded by her feathers. She felt completely alone and incredibly free.

--

Labels: love, mywriting

maybe I will start (again).

I am writing a book. I've written more on it than I've ever written on one piece, so that's a big deal.

Here's a short excerpt from it. I'm practicing with letting people read things. This part is in a section that describes' a few of each of the main character's unrealized ideas.

The book is (ironically?) about creative stagnation and about what drives people to make things and what people get distracted and inspired by. This particular page is 'cute,' more so than the rest of the book. I ain't Miranda July or nothing.

Libi

Libi thinks she will start a record and book store of her own. Instead of categorizing things alphabetically or by boring genre-related sections such as “true crime” or “country,” she will make the experience of browsing the store itself a perfect adventure.

In one corner, next to each other:
“Books With Perfect First Lines” and “Albums Too Sad Too Sleep To Even Though They Sound Sleepy."

Along the right hand wall:
“Books With Funny Author Photos."

Next to that:
“Albums For Driving With The Windows Rolled Down and/or Bicycling After The Apocalypse.”

There will be a small endcap of “Albums People Who Work Here Lost Their Virginity Too” and another one of “Books With Characters That Remind The Owner Of This Store Of A Boy Named Peter” and another “Albums For First Kisses” and another “Books Whose Movie Adaptations Are Better Than The Books Themselves, Which Is A Rare Thing – Sorry We Don’t Sell Movies.”

If you bought a book at the store, you’d be given a small handmade blank journal. If you brought it back with a short story in it, the story would be shelved under “Stories Written By People Who Shop Here” -- if anyone bought your story, later, you'd get the ten dollars the store charged for it as store credit -- and you’d be given a blank CD. If you brought the CD back with a mix of “Songs To Play In A Record Store,” it would go into regular rotation and you would receive a small lifetime discount.

Libi thinks maybe if she ran the store for a few years she would start some other projects too. She would start drawing pictures of the people who made the mixes, or illustrating the Stories Written By People Who Shop Here. The store would get a kind of cult following, adorable people would travel to shop there, it would be like The Factory without drugs. Maybe they would hold contests and all of Libi's friends could play their songs and then they could record the shows and sell "Live from Levy-Land" albums. It wouldn't really by called "Levy-Land," though, she would come up with a less narcissistic and more precious name, a name that would force itself out of everyone's mouth just because it was so fun to say.

Labels: mywriting

A dining review written by Summer and Jeff as soon as we got back to Jeff's apartment last night...

Our young heroes order Wan Fu to be delivered in times of need. But last night, they wanted to sit down somewhere, so a momentous decision was made. Eating inside at the original Wan Fu on east Oltorf.

Summer and Jeff entered the warehouse like building confused, wondering if the people loitering at the front door were in line. It turned out to be homeless people, as confused as we were. Summer was wearing a green and blue skirt and a green jacket, Jeff was wearing whatever he always wears. They were surrounded by ornate decoration in the massive front area. They were finally seated by a woman pleading for death. She immediately questioned Summer frantically about why she was wearing green and whether she was in uniform. The desperate hostess tried to explain that the previous customers had also been wearing green. She made a mysterious choking motion, hands around her neck, prompting Jeff to remark later on that she has probably been pleading for death every night for four years, but since no one understands her silent signals, she has to work another day. Every day. Forever.

Summer and Jeff were seated among the pseudo-authentic eastern décor, peppered with statues, a burnt out Budweiser neon, and piles of boxes. Our waiter greeted us -- “We have a problem.”

He held his chest tightly. “The soda machine doesn’t work.”

We tried to assure him that we didn't want soda anyway, but he clearly thought we were lying and promised to go work on it.

Attempting to find a vegetarian appetizer, we blindly ordered fried won-tons. They were sampled cautiously…

Summer was the first to speak up. “These wontons are the chips and salsa of the orient.”

The phrase “orientalmex" was born.

The dipping sauce accompanying the wontons resembled thick cherry kool-aid and was pronounced by Jeff to taste just like ketchup. Summer objected to the description, but time would tell...

The radio blared generic 90s music, identified by Summer as Third Eye Blind. “You know, they came out around the same time as Matchbox Twenty”. The music faded in and out and varied in volume constantly as though they had given a small child exclusive rights to the volume knob.

Our waiter was a nervous wreck. He apologized constantly, a Hugh Grant without charm. We ordered entrees and he inquired “how would you like your chicken roasted?”

Jeff was confused again. Summer asked if to imagine that he was headless chicken, and he speculated that his soul was leaking out of him.

They discussed the apocalypse. Jeff proposed war over plastic troughs of waters like the ones we were gulping. Summer eyed her water cautiously.

When our entrees arrived, there were accompanyed by many mysterious empty plates of various sizes. One was quickly ushered away, accompanying by more whining from our sleepy waiter.

“I usually serve the lady first but my hands were full. I’m so sorry.”

His eyes pleaded for death as well. This was not our beautiful house.

Summer’s pepper-slathered fried rice was enough to feed a family of Schwartzeneggers. Jeff’s seasame chicken resembled nothing so much as testicles cooked in brown sauce and covered in pencil shavings.

While shoveling broccolis and spoonfuls of pepper into her mouth. Summer notixed some abnormally large cans in the back room.

Jeff turned around to check it out and immediately turned back. "One of those is ketchup." The can was approximately the size of a fire hydrant.

We didn’t know how to leave; paying the bill made Summer wring her hands with despair and confusion. If we stayed much longer, we too would start signaling strangers to put us out our misery.

On the way home, Summer tried to remember the name of a Billy Bob Thornton movie and she said she thought the title was a four letter word.

Jeff: “Poop? Back? Owls?”

Labels: funny, lovedones, mywriting